The Universalist. [volume] (Chicago [Ill.]) 1884-1897, 1887-03-12
HENRY WARD BBEOHER.

at the present writing (M0nday even
ing) he lies unconscious, and is evil
IDENTIFY nearing the end. The physicians
offer no hope of his recovery. He may
linger few hours or even days, simply
as "a breathing machine" as DIR. Ham
mond puts it, until vitality is exhaust
ed, but beyond this there is no expec-
tation. Perhaps, before these lines are
in type, he will have passed away. The
great preachers great work is done,
the earthly record fully rounded up, and
Beecher's magnificent career closed.
Henceforth, he who has been for thirty
years or more commanding figure in
the Present, will belong to the Past.
He goes to join the Great Majority.
There is no man now living in Amer
lea whose death will create so great a
vacancy, and there are onlya few names
in Europe which are more widely known.
For the past thirty years Henry Ward
Beecher has been eminent among en-
inent Americans, by reason of his rare
endowments, the magnitude of his
public services, and the vigor and ver-
satility of his pulpit and platform elo-
quence. Henry Ward Beecher has
been striking figure in American pol
itics and the American pulpit. A vet
eran of the great anti-slavery conflict,
an inspired tongue of fire in our civil
war, and an advanced and progressive
thinker on religious and social themes,
he has occupied the front rank of pub
lie attention for more than genera
ton. He has been a public inspiration
in the widest possible sense-a vast dis
tributing reservoir of moral and relig-
ious thought, and he has largely infu-
enced public opinion, and nodded anew
doctrines and institutions. The broad
humanitarianism Of the man, his SYM
pathy with his kind, his quick, ardent,
sunny and hopeful nature; rich, over
flowing humor, and the facility with
which he could seize upon and formu-
late the everyday hopes and inspira-
lions of humanity, transferring them
in the light of his genius, gave him an
easy passport to the popular heart.
No man of the generation has been
so conspicuously before the public. His
sermons in Plymouth church were list
ened to by thousands from Sunday to
| Sunday; but an audience as wide as
| the country read those discourses as
they were printed, and from ocean to
ocean, and beyond the sea, the people
followed Beecher, and were fed by his
thought. In addition to his sermons
this mans opinions and writings were
quoted on all prominent topics of ma
tional and international welfare. In
the "ferce light that beat upon'' his
pulpit throne, there was no secrecy or
concealment. He was followed with
respect and attention where his opin-
ions were often reprobated. He was
monarch in the kingdom Of ideas; he
was always fresh, vigorous and inter-
esting; his versatility was marvellous
his gifts of pungent expression unrival-
led. If he was not what is generally
regarded as an original thinker, he had
the supreme faculty of molding over
the thoughts of thinkers in such man.
ner as to make them more royal and at
tractive; when they once passed through
the alembic of his imagination, and
found expression in his genius, they were
peculiarly his own. He was gifted
with a high poetic imagination which
adorned and removed from the region
of the commonplace whatever he touch
ed. He was in accord with nature;
loved all beautiful things; birds, flow
ers and the splendors of earth, sky and
ocean. He had the poets eye for all
natural beauty, and the artists love of
color. He was marvellous word pain
ter, and could, when he pleased, rival
Ruskin in his description. In the OratOry
of the platform, easy, direct, witty and
conversational, dealing with the COM
monplaces of the hour, he was unex-
celled. Those who heard Mr.. Beecher
in the old anti slavery days, and during
the civil war, will never forget his plat
form eloquence, and the vivid, electric,
and powerful appeals which he made in
behalf of freedom and the country.
His services to the imperiled nation
during his visit to England in 1858,
when he faced the mobs of Manchester,
Edinburgh and Liverpool, as veritable
lion Of the tribe of America, were inval-
liable, and will be remembered to his
honor in succeeding generations.
One passage from his speech in Lon
don, at Exeter Hall, the last in that
notable series of patriotic addresses, is
as follows thrilling even now that
quarter of century has gone by since
the words were uttered standing by
''my cradle, "said Mr.. Beecher," standing
''by my hearth, standing by the altar Of
'the church, standing by all the places
"that mark the name and memory of
'heroic men who poured their blood
''and lives for principle, declare that
sin ten or twenty years of war we viii
sacrifice everything we have for prin-
"ciple. If the love of popular liberty